


There's no 'doing better' without you

by carmelitilla



Category: The 100 (TV), The 100 Series - Kass Morgan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bellamy may try to kill Clarke, Children of Gabriel, F/F, F/M, Heda Lexa (The 100), Love, Love Confessions, M/M, Medium Burn, Prisoners, Spoilers, Time Travel, Wanheda Clarke Griffin, Wonkru, mentions of Gaia/Clarke, mentions of Lexa/Clarke, mostly a bellarke fic, post 07x03, season seven divergent, void! bellamy, we may get into some weird science
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:48:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 10,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24663367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carmelitilla/pseuds/carmelitilla
Summary: Where instead of going through the Anomaly, Echo, Gabriel and Hope head to tell Clarke Bellamy's been taken. Clarke finally admits she's Wan-fucking-Heda and on we go trying to get him back. Except when he comes back, he's obviously been gone for years with the time alteration between planets and has to kill her.*EXCERPT***********“Find the rest of Wonkru,” she says really before she means to. “Tell them to come here.”“They won’t come, Clarke.”“They will if you ask for their best warriors.”“What? Why?”Clarke pulls out her gun and fires once at the ceiling. The room settles into silence.“We’re calling a Conclave.”*********In other words, everything I want from Season 7 that I probably won't get — which is fine because the show is great and it can do what it wants — but also I need some love confessions people, I NEED THEM. Shoutout to the Tumblr folks whose speculations I devour after each episode to keep the wheels turning and the hope burning.
Relationships: Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin, Emori/John Murphy (The 100), Eric Jackson/Nathan Miller
Comments: 24
Kudos: 85
Collections: Bellarke in The 100 world, the 100





	1. I wanna feel the way I used to

**Author's Note:**

> WAIT! STOP!  
> If you have not watched up to 07x03 and care about SPOILERS, do not read this. 
> 
> If you have or you don't care... Well, carry on.

Clarke can feel the eyes of everyone she’s known since Earth even as she gazes just above the sightline of everyone she’s met since coming to Sanctum. 

They’ve ended up back in the Primes’ castle. The place is quickly becoming the unofficial council chambers for the lost factions of the human race. She wonders how she didn’t notice all the red before, so clearly paying homage to the bodies it was built upon. 

_Way to keep it positive, Clarke,_ she thinks. 

The Children of Gabriel are loud and angry. They jostle amongst each other, egging the others on like puffing out their chests might earn them the restitution they’ve been denied for generations. 

The Followers of the Primes are timid behind the man who tried to _adjust_ Jordan. He demands to be heard, slamming his fist on the table Russel Prime once invited her to, before withdrawing with a disgusted scowl. 

Then there’s the Prisoners who act like they’re just along for the ride in their matching tan overalls and white tank tops. Callous, malicious and seemingly led by a man who feigns nonchalance — but if Clarke had to put money on it, the lethal woman behind him is the one calling the shots. 

Indra has Wonkru shift among them, her eyes flitting from Clarke to the rest of the room. She’s as ready for a fight as she can be but she’s working with limited resources now that Madi isn’t Commander. 

_Thanks Gaia,_ Clarke sighs glancing at the sullen warrior who stands vigil in the mouth of the castle chamber wing. Brown eyes lift to meet hers, but Clarke isn’t ready to decipher the mysticism growing there.

“We have to do something,” Miller says close to her ear. He has his gun on his hip, strap hanging over his wrist. 

Raven stands against the wall behind him. She’s visibly shaken — par the course after being beat within an inch of consciousness. Jackson should be tending her, but she doesn’t want the help. Clarke can relate; the pain reminds her of what she’s done. 

_But it didn’t make sense when I did it,_ she thinks bitterly. It wasn’t so long ago that she let her emotions get the better of her, acted rashly, made hard choices, got people killed — but when she loses control everyone gets to blame her for it.

“Clarke,” Miller urges. Indra is giving him that “NOW” look and it’s left to her to sort this shit out. If they don’t want her as a leader, why do they keep making her lead?

She doesn’t know what to do. Most of these people have nothing in common and she’s lost the power to force them down a peaceful path. The more she tries to take control the more things slip through her fingers — just like her mother. 

_I used to think fighting is what we do, but now I wonder if fighting is what we are._

“Find the rest of Wonkru,” she says really before she means to. “Tell them to come here.”

“They won’t come, Clarke.” 

“They will if you ask for their best warriors.” 

“What? Why?”

Clarke pulls out her gun and fires once at the ceiling. The room settles into silence. 

“We’re calling a Conclave.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Grace VanderWaal - Stray  
> Lyrics  
> I wanna write a song  
> One that can explain my loss  
> I wanna write a song  
> That you can hear and  
> Know how my heart yearns  
> And how my insides churn  
> And how my cheeks burn  
> From the weekly storm  
> And how my face turns  
> Before you return to the wall  
> And then down the floor  
> I keep only seeing rain  
> I will say no  
> But you keep crawling in my brain  
> I wanna get lost, run away  
> In the dark is where I will stray  
> I gotta write a song  
> But I wanna feel my words  
> And I keep getting it all wrong  
> Think it out, write it out, rip it out  
> Throw it all to the wall  
> And I keep only seeing rain  
> I will say no  
> But you keep crawling in my brain  
> I wanna get lost, run away  
> In the dark is where I  
> I wanna feel the way I used to  
> I wanna move the way I used to groove  
> I wanna feel the way I used to  
> I wanna move the way I used to groove  
> But I keep only seeing rain  
> I keep saying no  
> But you'll find your way into my brain  
> I wanna get lost, run away  
> In the dark is where I  
> I keep only seeing rain  
> I will say no  
> But you keep crawling in my brain  
> I wanna get lost, run away  
> In the dark is where I'll stray  
> Wanna feel the way I used to  
> I wanna move the way I used to groove  
> I wanna feel the way I used to  
> I wanna feel the way I used to


	2. I wanna feel the way I used to (part 2)

John slowly guides the zipper of an emerald silk dress up between Emori’s shoulder blades. He glides light fingers over her soft skin, squeezing her arms gently as he peeks over her shoulder into the gold framed mirror. She’s a vision.

“They sure knew how to dress,” she says, smirking at him. 

“Have to look the part playing a god,” he smirks back. He drops his fingers to her wrist and he twirls her into his chest. It does cruel, wonderful things to him; seeing her have what he never thought he’d be able to give. 

“What?” she asks peering up at him. “What are you thinking, John?” 

There’s a mischievous glint in her eye — the one that stole his heart the day they met in the desert. 

He spins her around again. She stumbles over one of the many outfits they’ve tried and tossed on the floor. He catches her, laughing. 

“We should probably clean up this mess,” she says a little breathless. 

John hums and presses his nose into her hair, “Don’t gods have servants for that?” 

He pulls her back against him and hisses when she waggles playfully. 

“I think we’ve played dress up long enough,” she whispers. 

John shuffles backward towards the bed, pulling her with him —

“Murphy!” Clarke demands from other side of bedroom door. 

Emori jolts away from him, surprised. John falls back onto the bed with too many pillows. He moans at the ceiling, “What?!” 

John glares at Emori as she makes her way to the door. She’s smirking at him as she opens it. 

Clarke storms in, a flurry of blonde hair and fury. Miller’s hot on her heels. 

“Sorry,” she says. “I lit most of the other rooms on fire.”

John forces himself to get up slowly, but he’s known her long enough to sense her urgency. 

“I remember,” he says. She spares him an uneasy glance before she turns to face the footsteps thundering after her. 

“Clarke, you can’t do this!” Gaia nearly shouts as she blazes into the room. Her hands fist at her sides to keep control, “You can’t possibly bastardize our faith like this.” 

“Your faith is already dead, Gaia,” Clarke cuts. She checks over her shoulder to make sure John is at her back. She’d deny it, but he knows better. 

“The Age of the Commanders is over, but maybe some wisdom can still be drawn from them,” Indra’s halting baritone sends a shiver down John’s spine. She sweeps past Clarke, checking corners and windows to make sure the rooms secure. 

When she looks at John he turns his hands up.

“Mother,” Gaia rounds on her. “You can’t possibly agree with this.” 

“Agree with it or not, we lost our authority the moment you told Wonkru Madi was no longer Commander —” 

“You did what?” Emori asks, eyes wide. 

“At least this way we might keep leadership within our people,” Indra continues. She moves to Clarke’s left, her hand resting on the hilt of her blade.

There’s a tense moment of silence, each of them waiting for the other to blink. 

“What did you do, Clarke?” John asks. 

“She called a Conclave!” Gaia spits. She looks wounded, her shoulders rounding forward even as her chest pulls back. She places her hand over her heart. 

“You did what?” Emori asks, looking to John. They’re both playing catch up. He moves closer to her, “So much for doing better.”

“What would you have me do, Murphy?” Clarke glares at him. Her eyes land on each of them, “What would any of you have me do?” 

“Not this,” Gaia says immediately. 

Clarke takes a deep breath.

“Gaia, you have to understand, we’ve lost control,” she pleads. “The only way we get out of this alive is if we defuse the bomb that’s sitting out there.” 

“With more violence,” Gaia hisses. 

John can almost feel the tension between them, something unsaid. Clarke’s hand moves as if to reach for the former flame keeper, but thinks better of it.

“If the Children of Gabriel win the Conclave, John, they’ll kill us,” Emori tells him lowly, standing close enough now that her arm brushes against his. 

He’s caught between admiration and fear for her. Her analytical mind always catches him off guard, always deciphering what matters before he does. 

“So whose going in the pit for us?” Miller asks. He can’t like the idea, John thinks. Not after being trapped underground with Bloodreina for years. 

“Madi is our best —” Indra starts. 

“Echo is our best warrior,” Clarke cuts her off. 

“Echo isn’t here,” Gaia stresses. 

“If she can win the Conclave maybe she can draw them back behind her —”

“I am not sending my daughter into a pit!” Clarke shouts. She pinches the bridge of her nose. John notices the rare show of weakness. He watches as she adjusts, brings herself back into focus. 

“Miller, I need you to go to Gabriel’s camp and bring back Echo —” 

“And Bellamy,” John says. He’s been away too long. Clarke can’t do this all on her own. 

“And Bellamy,” Clarke agrees. “Gaia, will you make the preparations? Explain to the factions how it works, what it means?” 

“I will not,” she says definitely, eyes burning. 

“I will,” Indra says. 

Clarke nods, pressing her lips together. She explains the court yard will be the arena. John snorts at that. He remembers Bellamy choking him in the pond as the Red Sun toxin nearly drove them all insane. 

He looks at Emori, “Good times.”


	3. Turn back, leave all you had

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Your response to this has been unexpected and awesome! I'll try to update once a week, by the following Saturday.   
> Thanks guys :)

“Bellamy!” Echo shouts as her lover’s dragging feet disappear behind the tree line. The green mist of the Anomaly is recoiling as she pivots around that tree. Two dark figures with Bellamy’s limp body strung between them chase after it. 

“Stop!” she demands, stringing her bow. She takes aim — 

A whistling shot lands to her right. The force explodes her backwards. She throws her arms out to stop from twirling. She hits the hard ground chest first. 

Echo coughs, gasping for breath. She opens her eyes long enough to see Hope and Gabriel charge past her. A blink, and they’re meeting the same fate. 

“They took Bellamy!” she sputters, trying to push herself up. She manages her arms underneath her and stumbles up. 

The forest is silent. Nothing but the grey sky of the horizon peeks through the trees. 

“Bellamy!” she cries. 

** ____________________ ** ____________________ ** ____________________ **

The familiar hum of a faraway engine stirs Bellamy first. The foggy space between dreams and consciousness conjures illusions of the Ark. He thinks he’ll open his eyes and Octavia will be 14, peeking over the bunk above him. 

He smirks to himself, imagining her long ponytail hanging over the railing. But the more the vision comes into focus, the more he realizes it’s not her colour of auburn hair. It’s red, deep red —

“Octaiva!” he shouts, bolting up right. Harsh fluorescent lights nearly blind him. He shields his eyes. 

_ Where am I? _ He’s assaulted by flashing memories; Gabriel’s tent, Echo asking him if they’d be staying in the mansion Clarke had confiscated from the Primes, the Anomaly flaring around them, a young woman cutting her way into the tent, Octavia dying in his arms, crying out her name, a whistling, blackness. 

“He’s awake,” comes a distorted voice. 

Bellamy forces his eyes open. The room is small, pod-like. Smooth, grey walls curve around where he sits on a matching medical cot. There’s a door open before him flanked by two dark figures. 

He registers they’re armed first. He throws himself off the cot shoulder checking the closest figure into the wall. He pulls back and punches, colliding with a helmet that’s mirrored like a giant fly eye. 

Bellamy curses, rearing back as his knuckles crack. The second figure wraps their arms over his chest. 

“Wait,” they demand. 

He drops his weight, pulling them both down as the first figure charges them. They wind up a mess of limbs on the floor, pushing each off the other, trying to stand. 

Bellamy takes a kick to the gut. He grunts and roll out of the way of a second. He pops up near the door and dashes through it. 

He stares down a long grey hallway to nowhere.  “Shit.” He picks left and takes off. 

A corner comes upon him suddenly. He skids, fingertips grazing illuminated tile to keep balance.  More strange dark armoured figures appear. He shoves one of them as he bolts by. They shout after him. 

Two more corners and Bellamy doubts he’d be able to find his way back. He hopes his zigzagging will slow his pursuers. 

He checks back as he comes to a deep stairwell. He catches shadows on the far wall and hurries down, two at a time. T he next landing is more hallways so he dives further. 

Bellamy ducks under the stairs at the next landing, crouching low. Heavy boots thunder above him. He pulls closer to the alcove. 

“Where did he go?” 

Four figures stand before him, weapons drawn. 

“He can’t have left the ship.” 

_ Ship?  _ he thinks. 

“Double back. He’s not here.” 

Bellamy checks around the stairs as they recede. When the coast is clear, he takes the door ahead of him and stops short. 

He’s standing on a long metal overhang. Below him, small, narrow ships line a metallic tunnel as long and wide as a football field in the old world vids. 

It’s a hangar bay, he realizes. And past them, an open space to swirling, inky black spotted with stars. 

“Space,” Bellamy breathes stepping to the railing.  _ How the fuck did I get to space? _

“There he is!” 

He starts. Black figures stream onto the overhang from a door to his left. He pivots right but five more come from a second door. 

He’s trapped. 

“Hands up, behind your head,” one of them says. They point their gun at him. 

Bellamy curses. He checks over the railing. It’s too far of a drop. 

“On your knees.” 

He sighs and raises his arms. He moves to kneel — 

“That won’t be necessary,” someone says from behind them. 

“Mistress -” 

“Move aside, Flynn.”

The guards part and one of them comes forward. 

“Long time no see hotshot,” the figure says. The voice sounds familiar but Bellamy can’t quite place it. This figure looks exactly the same as the others. 

“Who are you?” he demands. 

“Can’t help but feel like we’ve been here before,” the figure touches their temple and the reflective shield clears. Jade eyes wink at him.  Charmaine Diyoza. 

She offers him her arm, clapping him on the shoulder as he stands. 

"I have to be honest, I thought you'd be more trouble," she shrugs. "We cornered you in no time — maybe you're going soft."

“What in the hell —”

“Bellamy?”  That stops his heart. He looks for the voice. 

“Get out of my way!” she demands. Then she's there, hair tied away from her bright eyes and a grounder shawl around her shoulders. 

“Octavia,” he whispers. His knees threaten to give out. 

She plows into him, hugging him so hard it knocks the wind out of him. 

“You’re alive,” he says, pressing his cheek against her crown. His chest clenches and he squeezes his eyes shut to stop from being overwhelmed. “I thought I saw you —” 

“You can blame Diyoza for that,” Octavia pulls back. She smiles up at him through watery eyes. 

“Hey, hey,” she says, thumbing the tears from his cheeks. “I’m OK.” 

Bellamy nods. He shoves his emotions down and blinks at Diyoza and the guards watching them. 

“Are you in charge here?” he asks. 

She smirks at him, “Would that anyone else could do the job.” 

Diyoza makes a spinning motion with her gloved hand. The guards begin to disperse, talking amongst themselves. 

“We need your help,” Octavia draws him back. 

Diyoza nods, “We have work to do.” 


	4. What's in a name

An angry, reddening sun is sinking behind Echo and Hope as they reach the castle courtyard.

Echo notices the charred bases of the towers first, then that no one notices them. Men and women are moving back and forth with an urgency that thickens the air and makes the hair on the back of her neck stand at attention. 

A sea of earthen tones marks the Children of Gabriel gathering at the ale house. Their leader, a passionate man Echo remembers meeting just once, paints a large swirling symbol over the door. 

“Nelson,” she calls, weaving her way through the crowd. Laughter erupts from the machine shop and she pauses, clocking the Prisoners jostling across the courtyard. A handful of men are carving nooses and hanged figures along the side of the building. 

_They’re marking their territory,_ she realizes. 

It’s then that she notices mixed woods and mixed metals laid between the buildings. She dodges a Wonkru warrior who passes with a log perched on his shoulder.

Echo trots up the castle steps to get a better view. The Wonkru warrior tosses the log not far from the summit where they came up. She follows the barrier to the closest building, around to the castle, and then along the other side where other warriors are building. 

It’s a haphazard circle; a wall being built around the entire upper platform of Sanctum. 

“What’s going on?” Hope asks, a few feet behind her. 

Echo regards her skeptically. She doesn’t know. 

She makes her way inside, careful not to touch the scorched entryway. 

The Followers of the Primes are huddled just inside. Emori stands among them, keeping her posture rigid in the pretense of a Prime. 

Echo eyes them for weapons, but she’s already decided they’re more a risk to themselves than they are any of her friends. Mostly, Emori looks awkward, she thinks. 

“We’re not fighters, holiness,” a woman with long dark hair is saying. “What are we going to do?” 

Emori meets Echo’s eye and nods towards Indra. The Trikru warrior has caught sight of them from the mouth of the banquet chamber. 

“Good, you’re here,” Indra says as she reaches them. Echo notes the gun slung over her shoulder as she gauges Hope. 

“Where’s Miller?” 

Echo looks at her. 

“He was supposed to bring you back.” 

“We must have missed each other,” she shakes her head. “Indra, we have a problem.” 

“That will have to wait,” she says, standing aside so Echo can walk with her. They stride towards the back of the castle like equals and Echo wonders at how far they’ve come. 

“Clarke needs you here.” 

“Clarke?” Hope asks.

“Our leader,” Indra says like it shouldn’t need explaining. There’s a new respect there, percolating since Lexa started taking Clarke’s word over her own. It’s taken a long time for her to come around. 

It had taken Echo a long time too. First she watched Roan grow to trust Clarke, then she listened to Bellamy tell stories of her on the ark. She would know what to do. That was the only thing holding her together, “I need to see her, Indra. Now.” 

Indra frowns at her as they come upon Josephine’s old bedroom. She ushers Echo inside but stops Hope, “Not you.” 

“Both of you are really inviting, you know that?” Hope sucks on her teeth and crosses her arms. “Fine, go, I’ll wait here.” 

Inside, Clarke stands over a short dresser, a map laid out beneath her. She’s pulled off her jacket and gun belt. Echo notices them hung over a chair by the door as she crosses the room. 

The map has an outline of the upper platform of Sanctum. Clarke’s already marked the faction houses. It’s a stance Echo has seen many times before. 

“You look like you’re preparing for war, Clarke,” Echo says. 

Clarke spares her a glance from the map, “Good, you’re here.” 

Echo presses her lips together and notes the exits; two windows and the door she came in. 

“Did Indra fill you in?” 

Echo looks around Clarke to meet Murphy’s eye. He gives her a nod from where he’s perched on the bed thrown with fluffed pillows and blankets. He’s fidgeting, thumbing the woven metal footboard. It puts her on edge, but Bellamy had taught her to trust Murphy too. 

“ — our best warrior. If you can win the Conclave —” 

“Win the Conclave?” Echo snaps back to Clarke. 

“Welcome to the party,” Murphy snarks. 

Clarke sighs, “Echo, we need a leader everyone can agree on. The infighting is getting us nowhere.”

Echo's mind turns, running through a variety of contingencies but ultimately coming to the same conclusion. 

Without leadership the people would fall — the factions weren’t large enough to stand on their own. That leadership had to come from someone everyone would follow. 

“Tell her, Echo,” Murphy says, standing to join them. “Tell her Bellamy would never agree to this.” 

_Bellamy_. She opens her mouth, and closes it again. “I — Bellamy isn’t here.” 

Clarke goes very still. Her eyes wander up Echo’s body before meeting her own, but she still isn’t ready for it. Crystal blue pierces through her and the world stops. 

“Where is he?” Murphy asks somewhere in her peripherals. She can’t look away from Clarke. 

The sky queen straightens, already sensing what’s coming. A scarce breath slips through her lips, “Tell me.” 

“They came from nowhere,” Echo begins, words tripping out of her mouth. “They took him, Clarke. Men in black armour with guns, or — I — some sort of guns.” 

The whole room has gone dark around them. It’s just her and Clarke. The only other person who could understand the gravity of losing Bellamy.

It all comes out in a rush. She’s overwhelmed by the emotion of it, letting herself admit it. She places her palms on the dresser and gasps. 

Clarke and Echo had never really come back from when she had betrayed Bellamy at Mount. Weather. If there was ever a relationship to be had after Clarke had saved her life from Praimfaya, it had been permanently crushed when she left Bellamy in Bloodreina’s fighting pit.

Even so, they’d built a mutual respect. It was something unsaid when she’d landed back on Earth. Clarke looked to her to protect Bellamy. 

Clarke was always saving everyone else, Bellamy was always saving Clarke, and if she was going to stick around, Echo was going to need to save Bellamy. 

“I couldn’t catch him,” she admits. Her failure. She waits for her punishment, forgetting for a moment in the Azgeda audience chamber. 

“Where did they take him?” 

Echo lifts her head but Clarke is looking over her. 

“They went into the Anomaly,” she says. She lifts her palms from the table and begins rebuilding her inner walls, replacing her armour. It’s habit to settle back into the role of warrior and continue the debriefing. 

“Gabriel stayed behind to try and find out how to follow them,” Echo says. “There’s a stone under his camp. We thought maybe if we could press the right symbols the Anomaly would open.” 

“So what - it’s a portal?” Murphy asks. 

Echo shrugs at him. “It must be. That’s how Hope came to us.” 

“Hope?” Clarke asks. 

“She stabbed Octavia.” 

Clarke staggers a bit at that. Echo wonders if she should have told her to sit down. 

“She doesn’t remember anything. But her name suggests —”

“She’s Diyoza’s daughter?” Clarke looks to the door.

"Octavia just disappeared."

Clarke nods, “Indra, bring her in.” 

Indra stops Hope just inside the room, “That’s far enough.”

Indra doesn’t trust her, really, neither does Echo. A name didn’t cement loyalty, or prove itself. But the young woman _looked_ like Diyoza. It was in the point of her chin and the shade of her green eyes. 

“Are you Hope?” Clarke asks. “Hope Diyoza.” 

Hope nods. She’s fiddling with a bit of something in her hands. Her fingertips are bloody. 

“You’re mother and I have an interesting history,” Clarke says, trying to make light of it. 

“And who are you?” she asks looking down at her fingers. She scans the room, jittery. Echo wonders if she sees the gun just in reach, if Indra does.

“I’m Clarke.” 

“Clarke Griffin?” 

Clarke takes a step towards her, nodding. Echo moves with her. Something is wrong. 

“You know me?”

Hope snatches the gun from the table and aims it at Clarke. Echo shouts, throwing Clarke out of the way even as Indra moves to tackle her. 

A shot rings off, deafening in the small space. The bullet finds purchase just below her ribs. Echo gasps, falling to her knees. It hurts less than being stabbed, she thinks. 

“Echo!” Clarke yells, picking herself up. She’s pushing her over, laying her down on her back. 

“Get her out of here,” Indra yells in the distance. 

Clarke peels her hand off her wound all she sees is red. 

“I’ll get Jackson,” Murphy dashes from the room. 

“Why would you do that?” Clarke was asking. She’s pushing down where the bullet went in, It hurts more than the shot itself. 

“We need you alive, remember?” she says. Clarke cups her face with her other hand. “We need you here.” 

“You don’t need me,” Echo manages. Clarke pushes harder and she groans. 

“You’re one of us, Echo,” she says as Jackson comes into view. He’s asking what happened but their conversation seems far away. 

“Hey!” Clarke demands, waking her up. “You stay right here. You’re not getting rid of us that easily.” 

Echo snorts at that. Something wet lands on her upper lip. She hopes it isn’t blood. 

“We need to get her to medical.” 

“OK, I’ll be right behind you,” Clarke says. Wonkru guards have brought a stretcher. They’re moving her onto it. 

“Clarke,” Echo calls. 

She’s there. 

“Bellamy.” 

“I know,” she says. Her bottom lip is trembling as she nods. “They’re going to prep you for surgery. Don’t die on me, OK? Bellamy would kill me.” 

Clarke watches Wonkru carry Echo from the room. She’s left there alone, trying to find her breath. _Get it together, Clarke_ , she tells herself. 

She wipes her hands on her pants and tears her eyes from the puddle blood on the marble floor. She picks up her gun with shaky hands. There’s a small piece of paper there; stained brown, crumpled. 

Clarke has to take a few more breaths before she manages to unravel it. The writing is thin, scratched and almost gone, but she makes it out. 

_Kill Clarke Griffin. Come home._


	5. I gave up control

Bellamy had the notes.

The way Octavia had explained it, time moved more quickly here than it did back where Clarke and the others were. “Here” being a ship, in space, orbiting one of two habitable planets in a solar system that included Sanctum, just on the other side of a Black Hole. 

Bellamy looks at the star map glowing faintly before him in the ship’s command centre. He rolls his shoulders back, and grabs for his elbows. It's a lot to take in — time travel, suspension, whatever it is. 

Flynn coughs behind him, standing near the door. Bellamy checks over his shoulder and the young guard gives him a short nod. 

Flynn had elected to stay behind while Diyoza and Octavia had gone to make ready for their descent to the ground. Bellamy got the impression he didn’t much like Bellamy being left alone in the command centre without supervision. That made him smirk,  _ smart kid.  _

He turns back to the map. There was a third planet somewhere closer to the Hole, which swirled as the vast epicentre of the solar system. “Skyring,” they’d called it. 

Bellamy couldn’t make it out on the map, but Octavia said time nearly stopped there. She and Diyoza had spent nearly a decade there raising Diyoza’s daughter, Hope. 

The fact that Diyoza had been pregnant — through everything — still shocks him. What a terrifying woman; he's glad she's on their side this time around.

Diyoza had had Hope sometime between Bellamy telling Octavia she was on her own, and their reuniting when Clarke was also Josephine. 

_ When she almost died _ , he winces. The memory of Clarke laying on the thin medical cot in Gabriel’s tent, her arms lifeless over its edges, unmoving, made stomach drop to his feet. She had died on him three times now, and it never got any easier. It’s hard to imagine what he would’ve done if the third time had been for real. 

Clarke keeps him human. It’s something he’s known for a long time. Even if sometimes it’s just his helping her remember her own humanity. Without Clarke, he’s rudderless. 

His thoughts wander back to Sanctum — a tiny blue dot on the map. He wonders how she’s doing piecing life back together on the moon after uprooting the Primes. It can’t be easy. 

_ I should be there _ , he thinks, not for the first time. With Clarke, and Echo, and the others. 

Bellamy looks back to Flynn. “Shouldn’t they be back by now?” he asks. 

“Admiral Diyoza said to wait for further instruction, sir.”

Bellamy swallows his smart remark, turning instead to the bow window. A terrestrial moon, with sands so red they make its oceans look aqua, hovers what seems like inches from the ship’s nose. If he didn’t know better, Bellamy would think he could reach out and touch it. 

He gets lost in its colours for a moment. They’re mesmerizing, hauntingly familiar in a way he can’t place. He thinks the blue is water, life; everything he wants for his people, but the red is fire, violence; the flame Prometheus stole that tainted humanity for eternity. 

They’d been at it three months already — boots on the ground Guerrilla warfare, chasing after some dictator asshole Diyoza liked to call "Her Majesty."  Octavia had gone back through the Anomaly to find him and dragged him into another war. She’d wanted to make amends, she'd said, and his help. 

Diyoza, Octavia and Hope had been captured on the Skyring. Brought here to the ship, where they’d met the Shepard, and his black armoured Disciples. He’d tried to recruit them into his Great War with the people on the ground. 

Diyoza, plus his sister, weren’t a pair anyone could’ve been prepared for. They’d taken control quickly, and Diyoza, being Diyoza, had set her sights on freeing the ground herself.

“You know what’s better than one inhabitable planet for what’s left of the human race?” she’d asked Bellamy when she’d explained it. “Two inhabitable planets for what’s left of the human race.” 

He'd nodded, hearing echoes of Clarke’s voice on genealogy and population diversity back when they were trying to choose who would survive Praimfaya. 

The trio hadn’t known about the Memory Law when they'd sent Octavia back to find him. Jumping through the Anomaly to different time zones, where time moves faster, or slower, could block your memories from another zone. Diyoza found out later the Disciples had tech that nullified the Memory Law. She’d sent Hope and a few guards back for them both. 

“Why isn’t Hope back yet?” Octavia had asked Diyoza, worry plain on her face. There was a softness there Bellamy hadn’t seen since Lincoln died. 

“Don’t worry,” Diyoza had said, reaching over to squeeze her hand. Bellamy didn’t miss that either. Their relationship had shifted while they’d been away — the women were family now.  “I’m sure she just wanted to sneak a peek of the heroes from your stories, Auntie O. She’ll come home when she’s ready.” 

Bellamy sighs, remembering. He might not understand the exact science behind the solar system, but he knows his sister was on one side of the war, and that means that's the side that matters. There's never a right side with war — just people trying to do what they believe in. 

A shrill horn sounds twice over the ship's comms. Bellamy resists the urge to cover his ears. You'd think he'd be used to it by now. 

"This is Admiral Diyoza," Diyoza's voice commands as the horn stops. "Mission Kryptonite is a go. All Disciples report to your stations, now. I repeat, Mission Kryptonite is a go."

A beep and the hiss of metal sliding against metal make him turn around. 

Octavia is there, armoured up like one of the Disciples. He doesn’t like it, but he's suited up the same. You can't deny good tech when you're talking life or death.

Octavia lifts her chin, “You ready? Diyoza thinks this leak might be legit.” 

“She said that about the last three raids, O,” he shakes his head, grabbing his helmet from where he’s left it on the command chair. 

Octavia shrugs, she motions for Flynn to fall in behind them as they head into the hall. 

“I’ve got a good feeling about this one, ma’am,” Flynn says. 

Bellamy snorts and Octavia rolls her grey eyes. 

“I’ll take ma’am over Bloodrenia any day,” she says. He has to give her that one.

“What’s so special about this one?” he asks, changing the subject before he can dwell on it. 

“Don’t know,” she says as they turn the corner. “She said someone in Her Majesty’s inner circle finally cracked. That was enough for me.” 

“So Diyoza says jump and you ask how high, is that it?” 

Octavia pulls Bellamy to a halt. They stand aside so a group of Disciples can jog by. 

“Bell, we’ve been over this," she says. "I trust Diyoza enough to follow her lead.” 

It’s another thing he doesn't like. It wasn’t so long ago he and Diyoza were on opposite sides. It wasn’t so long ago he and Octavia were on opposite sides. 

“Ten years, Bell,” she looks up at him like she’s asking him to look into her soul. “If you can’t trust her, trust me.” 

He _does_ trust her. Maybe because he’d thought he’d lost her when Hope stabbed her with the tracker that had dragged her back through the Anomaly. Or maybe it’s because he’d seen no signs of Bloodrenia in their last three months of fighting together. He's starting to believe he has his sister back. 

Bellamy nods and she gives him a small smile. 

The hangar bay is bustling with activity. Disciples are loading up in ships all around them. It makes Bellamy uneasy. Something about this mission feels different, feels larger — more than half their force must be prepping for descent. 

"Shot gun," Octavia shouts, sprinting to a sleek black cruiser. The ships are more like old world vehicles propelled by rockets than the angular space pods they had on the ark — another tech upgrade. 

Bellamy climbs in the back as Flynn manages the control pad from the pilot's seat. The doors fold down around them, pressing into place with the distinct hiss of an air seal. 

"Helmets on," Flynn says. 

"Here we go, big brother," Octavia's voice comes through the internal comms. 

"You hear me OK?" he checks back.  She gives him a thumbs up. 

"This is Trojan One to Admiral Command. We're ready for go, Admiral," Flynn says. 

"This is Admiral Command," a male voice answers. "You're clear for go, Trojan One." 

Bellamy straps in as the cruiser shifts from the hangar floor. He takes a deep breath. He hopes "Mission Kryptonite" is the last mission before he can go home. 


	6. I see red

Clarke stares down the palace hallway to a set of doors that could’ve been branches and glass leaves. 

Two Wonkru guards stand on either side of it. Between them, behind them, is a woman who claims to be Diyoza’s daughter. A woman that can’t be more than five years younger than Clarke, yet weeks ago was in her mother’s womb. 

Clarke tries to steal herself, but she blinks and the doors are metal and glass. An air lock door on Earth between her and a father with red hair and grey blue eyes.

_ Carl Emerson. Mount Weather, security detail. _

Clarke suppresses a shiver. She feels him behind her, a specter from another world, another time. 

_ "What's the matter? You don't like to be faced with your demons?"  _ he whispers in her ear. 

_ "If you want mercy, you're gonna have to ask me for it,”  _ she hears her reply like a bell in the quiet.

_ "I don't want mercy. I want revenge. I want you to suffer the same way that I've suffered. You can kill me, Clarke. You can never escape what you did. My pain ends today. Yours is just begun." _

Clarke takes a deep breath and banishes the memory, forcing herself to move towards the door. 

Maybe Emerson cursed her that day — doomed her to forever repeat the same cycle of violence. Defeat one enemy, and two more take his place. Like Hope; had Diyosa put her up to this? 

Clarke nods to the guards and one moves to unlock the door. 

“381 people. 182 men, 173 women, 26 children. Two of them were his,” she whispers. Maybe fighting is all she is, but as long as she remembers, she can change it. 

Hope’s pushed the metal bench in the holding cell to the back wall. She turns her face into the thin rays of moonlight filtering through the skylight as Clarke enters. 

Those eyes are Diyoza’s — a swirl of jade green and earthy lowlights — but they aren’t hard like the freedom fighter’s. They’re defiant, honest, brave and reckless. 

“You remind me of my daughter,” Clarke admits as the doors close behind her. She thinks of Madi home in bed, “That’s going to make this harder.” 

Hope scoffs and leans her elbows into her knees, “You don’t scare me, Clarke.”

Clarke smirks, “I suppose I wouldn’t scare easy either, not if my mother was a Navy Seal.” 

Hope peeks at her again. She shakes her head and begins to pick at her fingernails. 

Clarke takes a chair from the table in the corner and drags it closer to her. The young warrior freezes, tracking Clarke’s trajectory until she stops a few feet away. 

“I’m not here to scare you, Hope,” Clarke says as she sits. She unzips her black jacket. 

“But I do want to know why you nearly made  _ my  _ daughter an orphan today.” 

That earns Clake a look, a glimpse of guilt. “You know about Madi?” she asks. 

Hope nods, slowly. “I know about all of you,” she says, hesitantly. “I was raised on stories about you.” 

Clarke waits, letting the silence drag it out of her. She’s glad they’ve skipped past her pretending she doesn't remember anything. 

“When I was growing up, Auntie O — uh, Octavia — Bellamy’s sister —” 

“I know who she is,” Clarke nods. 

“She was there. She told me about Earth, how you survived,” Hope returns to her fingers. “You were kind of my hero, Clarke.” 

_ Never meet you heroes, _ Clarke thinks. “Octavia was the one who put you up to this?” 

Hope hesitates. She looks at Clarke again, sad. “No,” she admits. She sighs and turns towards her, settling in. Her guard comes down an inch, it puts Clarke a little more on edge. 

“You can ask me Clarke,” she whispers. “Mom told me to tell you everything, if I couldn’t — uh, if I was captured.” 

Clarke frowns, “Why would your mother send you to kill me?” 

Hope snorts, “She called it her last hope.” 

\---------

“Clarke?” Hope asks. 

Clarke stares through her. She’s drowning, caught up in the waves of every voice she’s ever silenced. She wants to gasp, or kick, or beg, but she can’t move. She’s paralyzed. 

Emerson had done it. He’d cursed her.

“Clarke?” Hope asks again. She reaches out as if to touch her, but thinks better of it. 

Clarke feels empty except for the overwhelming urge to discharge her insides all over the stone floor. More than anything, it strikes her how easily she believes it. How everything Hope told her has settled deep in her bones. 

It never ends. She ends up alone. Again. And it’s her fault. 

It’s Indra’s hand on her shoulder that finally rouses her. 

“It’s time to choose the champions,” she says, a silhouette in the yellow light that floods in from the hallway. 

Clarke nods and stands slowly. She pauses, wanting to say something to Hope who's looking at her with what — apprehension, pleading — she’s too tired to tell. 

“Are you alright?” Indra asks. 

“Fine,” Clarke manages. She rolls her shoulders back and moves towards the doors. 

“Treat her well,” she tells the guards as she passes with Indra. She picks up the pace heading for the courtyard. 

“Echo is out of surgery, but she can’t fight,” Indra says. “She’s lost too much blood. We need a new plan. Now.” 

It isn’t news to Clarke. She racks her brain for next candidates. Echo can’t fight. Gaia wouldn’t fight. Madi isn’t fighting. 

“What about you?” she asks. 

Indra gives her a long look. Guards are falling in behind them as they move through the halls, all of Wonkru coming to see who will fight for them. 

Sanctum’s moons are high in the sky outside. The chill night air wakes Clarke up, like snapping her from a dream. 

“I’m going to need an answer, Indra.” 

“I swore after the Bunker I would never fight in another ring.” 

That’s a sobering thought. Clarke adds it to the plume of darkness she’s fighting to stomp down her throat and into her rib cage. She had come to the same place as Bloodreina. The same as the Grounders. Put them in a pit. The strong survive, the weak die. 

Clarke stumbles on the last step, gripping the carved post at its base as her boots crunch the dusty landing. Hope was right. She takes a breath to stop the bile churning and wishes she could press her cheek against the cool stone. 

The factions have gathered before the castle. There’s an anxious anticipation about them, like no one can stand still. They’re murmuring quiets as Clarke approaches. 

Gaia peels herself from where she’s leaning in the shadows of the dias. She greets Clarke with a dark look from under the hood of a simple brown robe. She grips the rim of the empty bowl in her hands a little tighter.

Gaia was prepared to let her faith go. When the flame had been taken from them, she thought the Commanders had spoken. This was not their land, their spirits had no purpose here. 

She’d wanted to start anew. 

Clarke calling the Conclave had reminded her of what their ways had been born from. Clarke had been a Commander once, perhaps the wisdom of Bekha Pramheda spoke through her. Perhaps the Will of Commanders was once again being done by someone without the flame, as it had with the Red Queen. Perhaps her faith needn't end with the Flame. 

She doubted it, but then she had been full of doubt lately. If there was nothing left and the spirits remained on Earth, far from this place - at least she would be standing on the side of her friends. She would rather die with Clarke, than live in a world without her - she owed her that much. They all did. 

If Clarke is happy she’s changed her mind, she does nothing to give it away. The familiar anxiety she feels in the woman's presence twists tighter, but she chalks the feeling of  _ this is wrong  _ to her dismay that they always seem to return to the same place. 

“Mother,” she says, letting Indra know she’s aware how closely she’s watching her. “Clarke.”

“Are you ready?” Clarke asks. 

Gaia pushes her lips together in disapproval before turning to the gathered. 

“On this, the eve of the Conclave, we honour the fallen, and those we sacrifice for the good of the many, to choose one leader, stride one path,” she begins. 

Gaia turns to Clarke, drawing her knife. Clarke holds out her palm with glazed eyes. She doesn’t grimace as the Flame Keeper draws a line in her hand, spilling black blood into the bowl. 

“Will the champion of the Prisoners step forward?” 

A series of whoops erupt from the men and women in haphazard yellow overalls. A woman with sandy hair, and suspecting eyes, grins as the Prisoners part for her. She balances the point of a wide, curved dagger against her index finger as she saddles up to Gaia. 

“Hey blondie,” the woman winks at Clarke. 

“What is your name, champion?” Gaia asks. 

“Nikki,” she says. 

“Nikki kom Hononkru,” Gaia offers her the bowl. “Mark yourself with the blood of the Commanders. May their spirits guide you.”

Nikki raises her eyebrows and looks over the rim of the bowl. 

“You guys are into some weird shit,” she says. She dips her hand into the blood and lets it run through her fingers before sliding them between the braids woven across the side of her head. 

“Hononkru?” Indra asks as Nikki steps back to her cheering Prisoners. 

Gaia shrugs, “If we’re going to blaspheme we might as well trudge all the way to sacrilege.” 

Indra resists the urge to roll her eyes. 

“Will the champion of the Primes and their ways, step forward?”

The leader of the faithful steps forward as the Followers huddle together behind him. He looks like a man aged from boyhood in too little time, grey tunic sullied and hair pulling from his ponytail. 

“What is your name, champion?” 

“I — uhm,” the man grips his fingers. “Trey — but, I’m not —”

Clarke tilts her head to meet his wide brown eyes. 

“We call Russell Lightborne as - as champion,” he stammers. 

Gasps erupt from the assembled. A deep laugh draws eyes from Trey to the castle dias where a figure stands shrouded in layers of black leather and fur. 

Russell presses his face into the light, his smile too wide under a brow already painted black with blood. 

Indra takes a step forward, a hiss escaping through her teeth. She recognizes the mark of Sangedakru. 

“I have to say Clarke,” Russell says as he starts down the stairs. There’s a gravely edge to his voice, she hadn't noticed was there before.

“I really had something going, but you,” Russell exaggerates his exhale. “You took me completely by surprise.” 

He's still smiling when he comes to stand before her,  “It’s not often someone does that, but you, after all, are not any old some one."

Russell dips his thumb into the blood and holds it under his nose. He inhales deeply, “Are you, Wanheda?” 

The native twist of the word, the way the Trigedasleng comes perfectly from his lips, makes her blood run cold. 

Clarke pulls Gaia behind her, knocking the bowl from her hands. She levels her gun between his eyes before the blood spatters across the dirt, “Sheidheda.” 

The word passes from her lips to Wonkru, a slither of reverent whispers and halting gasps. In her peripherals some of the grounders kneel, but she can’t tear her eyes from his. She wonders how she hadn’t seen it before.

“Sheid-what?” Trey trembles. “This is Russell —”

Sheidheda spins, an unseen blade flying from his wrist. There’s a horrid squelch as it finds purchase in Trey’s neck, his voice tripping into a gurgle around “Lightborne.” 

“Insufferable weakling boy,” Sheidheda growls as Trey falls before the Followers. He eyes them with contempt.  “Always praying for salvation, well —” Shiedheda returns to Clarke, her gun still aimed high. “Praise be to me.”

Clarke's mind turns, searching for his angle, trying to still her anger long enough for a moment of clarity. 

Why would he reveal himself now, when no one would’ve known? 

His eyes have changed, she realises. The pain, remorse, and even compassion she had seen before in Russell is now wild empty; a pit of hunger eager to be challenged. 

“You can’t kill him Clarke,” Gaia says, close to her ear. Sheidheda smiles, she wants to knock it off his face. “If you kill him here, the Conclave is forfeit. He’s been called as champion.” 

Clarke glances at the Followers. They cower, eyes wide like frightened prey. They can’t see the monster behind the man. Would they still choose him? After everything?

_Blind faith._ Clarke shoots an accusatory glance at Gaia. There's a surety in the former Flame Keeper, like she knows they will. She does, doesn't she? She's been there. 

"You can't ask this of me," Clarke whispers, it nearly breaks as it crosses her lips. She sees Madi in the fear of the Followers. She's panicking, terrified, waking in the night screaming, “No!” 

"I have to," Gaia says. 

Clarke digs her nails into the slice in her palm.  “He’ll honour the rules of the Conclave?” she asks Gaia, straining to keep her voice steady. 

“Why wouldn’t I?” Sheidheda asks. “I’ve won against death so many times before.” 

It goes against every vein in Clarke’s body to lower her gun, but she manages it. 

Gaia steps closer, perhaps sensing how close Clarke is to the edge. She glides her fingers along the inside of her wrist, trying to ground her. “We’ll get him,” she breathes, a secret promise as she takes the gun. 

“Who is the next champion?” Indra barks as Sheidheda recedes to stand amongst the Followers. 

Nelson steps forward for the Children of Gabriel. He doesn’t want to wear the blood, but the argument fades into the background as Clarke watches Sheidheda. 

The Dark Commander presses the heel of his boot into Trey’s cheek, turning him with something like sick fascination. He winks at her, points at Trey and mouths, “Madi.” 

Clarke fights so hard not to lunge at him it feels like her whole body is vibrating. 

“Clarke, we need a champion,” Gaia says from somewhere past the buzzing in her ears. 

The clarity comes. Sheidheda had hurt her little girl. That he paid for it was all that mattered. 

“Me,” Clarke spits. When Gaia hesitates, she glares at her. “Call my name, Flame Keeper.” 

“Clarke kom —”

“My other name.”

Gaia shares a wary look with her mother. 

“Wanheda," she says, and the courtyard is suddenly silent. "Mark yourself with the blood of the Commanders.”

Clarke presses her palm against her mouth, drawing a bloody print from one cheek to the other.

"May their spirits guide you." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I See Red  
> Everybody Loves an Outlaw  
> -  
> Did you really think, I'd just forgive and forget, no  
> After catching you with her  
> Your blood should run cold, so cold  
> You, you two-timing, cheap-lying, wannabe  
> You're a fool, if you thought that I'd just let this go  
> I see red, red, oh red  
> A gun to your head, head, to your head  
> Now all I see is red, red, red  
> Did you really just say, she didn't mean anything, oh  
> I'll remember those words, when I come for your soul, your soul  
> Know that you, you dug your own grave, now lie in it  
> You're so cruel, but revenge is a dish best served cold  
> I see red, red, oh red  
> A gun to your head, head, to your head, oh  
> Executioner style, and there won't be no trial  
> Don't you know that you're better off dead  
> All I see is red, red, oh red  
> Now all I see is  
> Run, hide  
> Oh, you're so done  
> Oh, better sleep with one eye open tonight  
> I see red, red, oh red, oh  
> A gun to your head, head, to your head, oh  
> Executioner style, and there won't be no trial  
> Don't you know that you're better off dead  
> All I see is red, red, oh red  
> Now all I see is red, red


	7. "Where were you?"

Bellamy can’t get used to the colours on Bardo. They unsettle him. 

Every time he steps off the ship he thinks, this time they’ll seem more familiar. But the blues are bright when they should be muted; the rivers’ more aqua than navy. 

And the sky - the sky is worst of all. When it might be vibrant in the stifling heat of high noon, it’s shades darker than it should be — closer to night in the looming maw of the Black Hole just out of sight. 

He reaches down between his knees to a flower that’s been stomped into the red mud by Octavia. The petals are green and its stem is a warm, mustard yellow. 

_It’s like the colours are backwards here,_ he thinks, not for the first time. 

“Bellamy,” Octavia hisses, peeking through the foliage ahead of them. She beckons him up beside her. 

“That’s her,” she says, checking back to make sure Flynn is bringing up the rear. 

The figure in the distance is rigid enough to be a rat, Bellamy thinks. Dictator or not, it took a special kind of person to betray their people. 

She’s too still, ready to act in red leather from boots to wide shoulders. She blends with the landscape, easily missed by the unwatching.

Flynn snaps a twig behind them. Her eyes dart across the clearing. 

“Come out,” she calls, drawing a dagger from a long band of them fastened across her torso. 

“Come out or I start whipping knives into the trees.”

Octavia gives Bellamy a look that reminds him of his mother. She swings her gun behind her back and stands, passing into the clearing. 

Flynn moves to stand too, but Bellamy grabs his shoulder and yanks him back down. “Not yet,” he says. 

Octavia’s boots squelch in the not-river between her and the informant. It might be a vein running out to the nearby sea in the wet season. The land is lush at the base of Her Majesty’s mountain. 

“You’re not invisible,” the woman says as Octavia moves towards her. She keeps her knife in her hand. 

“You called us, remember?” Octavia lowers her arms. Standing side by side, they’re nearly the same height. Bellamy thinks Octavia could take her, if she had to.

“Is it just you?” 

Octavia touches her chin to her shoulder as if to look back at them, “And what if it is?” 

Bellamy activates the mirrors on his suit. Flynn does the same, they move in unison to her flanks. 

“You won’t be enough.” 

Octavia snorts and nods to Bellamy where he’s identified on her mask display. They deactivate their mirrors, appearing to the woman. 

She doesn’t startle. Her eyes — the colour of water in the shallows — stare into his mask as if she can see him. 

“Still not enough,” she says. It’s hard to read her expression over the midnight wrap that obscures her face. She sheathes her dagger. 

“I wouldn’t count us out just yet,” Octavia smirks. 

“Our people distract your people at the front, you get us in the back. Everyone goes home free,” Bellamy says. “It’s that simple.” 

The woman’s eyes snap back to him. He wonders if she really can see him. 

“What?” he demands. 

“Nothing,” she says quickly. “Your voice — it’s just — never mind. Common, we’re losing daylight.” 

The ascent begins not far past the clearing. It’s steep and treacherous, probably planned that way, Bellamy thinks. 

At times he’s sure they’re scaling close to 90 degrees with nothing more than roots and unfortunate seedlings to grapple with for climbing. Either way, he’s happy to be making his way away from the estuary that wraps this side of the mountain. 

Her Majesty’s city is built into the other side, he knows. Set in the base of the last in a long range of mountains on one side, and a peninsula before what the locals called the Vast Sea. A highly defensible position, at least, without spaceships. 

They’re there when they cusp the summit of the mountain. A fleet of black ships against the white beaches of the peninsula. 

Pools of troops pour from them, stacking themselves neatly in rows. They’re a black fog rising from the shadows of the setting sun, edging toward the tree line. 

If Bellamy squints, he thinks he can make out flashes of red between the forest canopy below. It’s the _other side_ preparing for battle.

“You see them down there?” Octavia asks over their private channel. 

Bellamy doesn't say anything. It fills him with dread, knowing how many people will die at sunrise if they fail. Even if they succeeded, would those loyal to their leader lay down their arms?

There was a special kind of brainwash that came with sharing a cause and a people. Bellamy had learned it under Pike. Octavia had learned it in the bunker. 

When you’re away from it, it doesn’t make as much sense. But when you’re in it — Bellamy sees Indra’s fierce scowl. She’s gripping her hip to stop blood spilling through her fingers. Pike stands beside him and looks down on her, something like disgust on his face. 

Bellamy knows it was unforgivable now, but he remembers believing then that the ends would justify the means. He remembers the feeling of the anger burning in his chest, giving him the fire to go on under a mountain of grief and guilt. 

Gina was gone. Clarke was lost. 381 lives had been taken at their hands. Nothing was bringing them back. What was another hundred? No one had ever cared about _their_ hundred. 

Bellamy takes a steadying breath. He flexes his fists. It was a battle they’d been fighting all along; knowing what cost was too great. 

But when you’re so far down the path of darkness, one more atrocity doesn’t seem so horrible. You’re inching down it, stretching thinner and thinner, but you never actually break. There’s still hope that everything you’ve done before will mean something as long as you keep going. 

It takes unbelievable strength to wake from that nightmare. 

Bellamy’s gaze drifts to the informant standing silently ahead of them, watching the horizon. He wonders after her strength. 

He hadn’t been strong enough on his own. He’d needed Clarke to see the light. Then she’d needed him. They’d been trading back and forth from that first day on the ground, before they’d even realised it. 

“I wish it didn’t have to be this way,” the informant says quietly when he comes to stand beside her. 

“For what it’s worth, there isn’t another choice,” he says. 

Fighting the Loyalists hadn’t been easy. They kept to their forests, silent and lethal where Diyoza’s men were better out in the open. 

Even with all their tech, the Loyalists found ways to circumvent them. They used the terrain to their advantage, drawing them into thick fog or across muddy bogs. Then, they never stopped coming. _The tenacity of a cause,_ he sighs.

“There’s always a choice,” the informant bites. She can't be much younger than he is. “A choice is the only difference between being up here with you instead of down there with them."

“Then why are you up here with us?” 

She looks up at him, a long moment between them before turning back to the horizon. A tear catches on her eyelashes before slipping into her wrap, “Because she’d want me to be.” 

There are dead men hanging by their feet at gallows outside the city limits. 

Bellamy tries not to look at them as the informant leads them to a tunnel underneath their swaying bodies. He’s seen worse in his lifetime; worse in the last few weeks. 

The tunnel leads them to the prison, from there it’s quick work through shadowed alleyways to a longhouse built in the centre of the city. It’s the only building lit by firelight. 

“Doesn’t this seem a little easy to you?” Bellamy asks Octavia as they circle around to the back. 

“We’re invisible, big brother. Take the win.” 

There’s only one guard at the back entrance. A man with dark skin, the same black wrap and red leather. 

“Heir,” he says as they approach. 

The informant nods. They brace arms. 

“Where are the others?” she asks. 

“Anyone who isn't preparing at the front I sent chasing ghosts over the wall,” he sighs. He looks around, “They’re here with you?”

“Yes.” 

“It shouldn’t have to be you.”

She pauses, “It couldn’t be anyone else."

The man nods. He takes a key ring from his belt and unlocks the door. He moves through it, announcing as he enters, “Your majesty, the heir has returned.” 

Bellamy feels calm as he enters the longhouse. He’s been a soldier for so long now, the anticipation of battle doesn’t panic him. 

Eight targets; six paired off at the other three entrances, one at the base of the throne platform, and a hooded figure on the throne. A throne that looks familiar somehow, backed by winding staves and spears. 

Octavia steals out to his left and Flynn to his right. He follows closely behind the informant as she begins to untie her wrap. 

He knows who his target is immediately — his focus gravitates to her, a practiced instinct picking up on the most dangerous person in the room. 

Her Majesty stands, a long black trench coat fanning out behind her, “Madi, what news?”

Bellamy’s heart stops. 

The informant checks over her shoulder and she _is_ Madi. She scrunches her wrap up between her fists to stop her hands from shaking. 

Her Majesty pulls down her hood, stepping down the platform. Her hair is cherry red, dyed with berries. She opens her arms, but Madi stops. 

“Clarke,” Madi says. 

“Now!” Octavia shouts. 

Bellamy moves on autopilot, dropping the target at the base of the throne even as Octavia and Flynn take their pairs. He'll realise much later it was Gaia at the bottom of the platform.

The guard from the door takes the third pair as everyone except the Her Majesty falls.

“Bellamy!” Octavia is yelling in his comms. “Take the shot!” 

Bellamy aims his gun at Clarke, put his fingers only twitch. She’s lowered her arms and she’s looking at Madi. 

“You knew,” Madi says. 

Clarke nods, stepping further into the torch light. Bellamy sees she’s older. There are crows feet at the corners of her eyes, frown lines bordering her lips. His hand is shaking.

“You are my daughter after all,” she says. “You always do what you think is right.”

“Is this what’s right?” Madi asks, stepping towards her. 

“Madi, don’t!” the guard yells. He pulls down his wrap as he passes Bellamy. 

“Miller?” Bellamy whispers. 

Miller is older too. He puts his back to Clarke and grips Madi’s shoulders. “This has to be done,” he tells her, looking her right in the eye. 

“You’re doing what I couldn’t, with Blood Renia, she had to be stopped and I couldn’t —” Miller coughs. He straightens, looking down to a blade now protruding from his sternum. 

“Nate!” Madi yells. He stumbles forward, pulling himself off the blade. 

Clarke watches him fall into Madi, dragging her to the ground with him. Her face has gone hard. She flicks the blood from her sword into the dirt. 

“This is what you’ve wrought, daughter,” she scowls. There’s a vehemence there Bellamy doesn’t recognize. 

Clarke moves quickly then, pulling a blade and flinging it into Flynn. There’s a flare of static over the comms as it buries in his eye. 

“Danmit!” Octavia shouts. 

Clarke grabs Miller by the back of his jacket and hauls him off Madi. She drags the young woman up and wraps her arm around her shoulders. She presses her sword into her throat, “Where are you friends, Maddison?” 

Madi trembles as she looks for them. Octavia moves in behind, lining up a shot. 

“Octavia, no!” Bellamy shouts. He deactivates his cloak, revealing himself. 

“Bellamy, what are you —” 

Bellamy tears off his helmet. “Stop,” he says, holding his hand out to where Octavia might be. He doesn’t know what’s going on, but he knows he has to stop it. 

“Clarke,” he says, meeting her blue eyes. “What are you doing?”

If she recognizes him, she doesn’t show it. She scans him from head to toe and narrows her eyes at him. “More ghosts,” she spits.

“I knew it was you,” Madi whispers. Her eyes are wide, pleading with him. She manages a nod, as if it’s OK. 

_None of this is OK!_ he wants to scream.

“If you knew we were coming, Momma, why is no one else here?” Madi asks. She's buying him time. 

“I didn’t want them to see you turn on me,” Clarke replies absently. She’s still staring at Bellamy, “If they don’t see it, you can still lead them.” 

“I don’t want to lead them Momma — not like you —”

Clarke draws the blade sharply up, cutting Madi off with a squeak. 

“Clarke!” Bellamy says again, taking a step forward. “Stop! This isn’t you.”

“What do you know?!” she demands. There’s pain in her eyes, like looking at him hurts her. She’s waring with herself, trying to convince herself he isn’t real.

“Madi is your daughter!” he reasons. 

“You need her alive!”

Bellamy presses his lips together and raises his hand back to his levelled gun, gripping it tighter, “You really think they won’t kill her to get to you? After everything you’ve done?”

Clarke shifts Madi to her other side. She catches the briefest puff of dust wadding from an unseen step. She takes a chance. 

“Arg!” Clarke tosses Madi backwards into Octavia. She charges him, “I did what I had to do,” she raises her sword, “Like always!”

Bellamy curses and holsters his gun. He rolls to the side, deflecting her blade with the armored guard on his forearm. It screeches when she pulls it free. 

“Clarke!” he begs, throwing off blow after blow. He ducks under a swing meant for his neck, “Clarke!” 

“You don’t get to use that name!” she cries, full of fury. She buries her sword into the wall, missing his torso by inches. She tries to pull it free, he takes the opportunity to lock his arms over her chest. 

He should’ve known better. She shifts her weight and he tumbles over her shoulder. His breath comes out in a whoosh as he lands on his back. 

Bellamy manages his gun from his holster. He shouts at her, but she straddles his hips and tries to wrestle the gun from his hands. 

“Clarke! Please!”

A single shot deafens the room. 

Clarke goes very still. Her face is just inches from his. 

“Clarke,” Bellamy whispers, but he can’t hear his own voice. Her eyes clear as he searches them, that clarity gives way to sadness. 

“I never would’ve hurt her,” she tells him. 

He nods, “I know.” He cups her face, “You’re OK.”

Clarke's eyes drift down to his mouth and she smiles just a little, “You haven’t changed a bit.” 

Her weight sags and her chest comes down to meet his. She gets heavier, then heavier still. Her forehead touches his before sliding cheek against cheek into the space above his shoulder.

“Where were you?” she asks, her lips brushing his ear. 

Bellamy wraps his arms around her. He sits up, cradling her head, “I’m sorry.” 

He doesn’t know if she hears him. She’s hanging on one moment, limp the next. He calls her name, squeezing her tighter. 

Octavia comes to stand in front of him. Her hair falls around her face as she removes her helmet. Her eyes are sad too. 

“I don’t understand,” he says, rocking Clarke in his arms. “What is this?” 

“It had to be you, Bell,” she says. "No one else could get close." 

Bellamy pulls Clarke back to look at her. He slides her hair away from her face. She’s different, but the same. He doesn’t understand. He draws her in close again. 

None of it makes any sense. Clarke is here, on Bardo, but she’s back home. She’s here in his lap, but she’s there too. Isn’t she?

“Target is down,” Octavia says into her wrist. “I repeat, the queen is dead.”

His sister crouches before him, but she's the enemy again. He looks through her, but hears her all the same. 

“And you’ll have to do it again.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Valentine's Day.


End file.
